Right after distributing the stats.
My vision was filled with white light.
A long time passed where I couldn't see or hear anything.
Then, I heard a voice.
「Your Mental Strength is 20. You gain the unique trait 'Indomitable' as a bonus.」
「Your Potential is 20. You gain the unique trait 'Perseverance' as a bonus.」
I inwardly rejoiced.
It sounds extraordinary, doesn't it?
I had a feeling since I was told to distribute stats, but it seems I've been reincarnated into a world with status windows.
I didn't know what effects the traits 'Indomitable' and 'Perseverance' would have.
But given they're called unique traits, they must be exceptional.
What would happen now?
As I've seen in web novels, would I be born as a baby?
I might grow up being called a genius from a young age, with my reason and memories intact.
How long did I spend pondering and imagining?
At some point, my body started to form.
Perhaps in my mother's womb.
A warm feeling.
Time passed, and finally, the moment of birth arrived.
With pain, light entered my still immature eyes.
I was thrown into the world.
I was born.
Just as I had prepared, I was about to cry out "Waah!" with all my might.
"Saak!"
That's the only sound that came out of my mouth.
Slowly, I could see ahead.
The first thing I saw wasn't my mother's warm smile.
No, it was clearly a woman's face, but not human.
There wouldn't be a person with such a huge body or smooth scales.
Around me were thousands of eggs.
Babies were being born from the eggs in real-time.
Little snakes slither out of the eggs along with mucus.
My body trembled.
Could it be that 'background' didn't simply mean social status or spoon color?
Did it include species too?
10 meant an average person, they said.
So, is 1 a snake and 20 a dragon?
... Is that how it is?
In the dark cave were countless babies and that monster-like mother.
I looked up at my mother.
Is that monster our mom?
──────────────
[Medusa Serpent lv89]
──────────────
As I stared intently, such a name appeared above the snake's head.
The mother quietly watched her babies hatch.
It was the moment when most of the individuals had broken out of their eggs.
A purple tongue flickered from the mother's lips.
Shriririt-
The noise of wind passing through a narrow place echoed.
And as soon as I heard that sound, my whole body stiffened.
They say your knees weaken when you stand before a beast, and that's exactly how it felt.
Although, having become a snake, I didn't have parts like knees...
Sure enough.
All my siblings, who had been crawling like insects, also stopped at once.
Some were trembling with fear and soiling themselves.
And I too, terrified to the point of mental collapse...
「You've been exposed to the Serpent's Fear. You're protected by the trait 'Indomitable'.」
I didn't soil myself.
I was scared enough to wet myself, my body was shaking, but somehow it wasn't to the point of truly going mad.
I, an ordinary citizen, had been reincarnated as a snake, becoming the son or daughter of such a human-faced monster.
Isn't this a terrifying situation enough to really drive one mad?
Yet somehow, I seemed to remain calm.
'Is this the power of 20 Mental Strength?'
There was no other way to explain it.
It was indeed a good choice.
... No, allocating only about 5 to background would have been the really good choice.
Chut chut!
Then the mother made a strange sound.
I kept calling her mother, which didn't feel right, and I absolutely refused to call her mom, so I decided to call her Medusa Mom.
At that moment, my siblings started crawling towards Medusa Mom all at once.
It was hard to believe they had been trembling with fear just moments ago.
The baby snakes crawled up that huge body and settled on Medusa Mom's scalp.
Somehow, my body became firmly fixed to the scalp.
I hesitated, then followed. I had a feeling that staying still here wouldn't be good.
And my choice was right.
Medusa Mom's scalp was carved with grooves so densely it was creepy.
When I inserted my tail there, my body was firmly fixed.
In other words, thousands of siblings became the wig for our bald mother.
Hair that ripples as if alive, no, actually alive.
Hair that sways glamorously, no less than a shampoo commercial.
Mother, seeming satisfied, raised her head and looked over the children who were still stiffly frozen.
Children paralyzed by fear, unable to obey orders.
Mother raised the rod of love for them.
In other words, she swung her tail.
Pububububuk!
As the massive tail passed, all that remained was blood and flesh.
Hundreds of siblings turned into bloody pulp in an instant.
Medusa Mom seems to be extremely strict about child education.
All my fate, born under such a mother, must be thanks to my background of 1.
... I couldn't tell if I was crazy now or in a normal state.
I swayed like that, attached to my mother's head.
I think it wasn't even a week since I was born like that.
Who would have thought that the armored man called Gunter would chop off Medusa Mom's head?
My monster-like mother died.
As I worried when distributing stats, I became an orphan who lost parents early.
This too must be thanks to my background of 1.
==
Wow.
I really crawled my tail off.
My body was covered in Medusa Mom's blood.
I was so out of it, I don't know how I escaped.
I entered the cave and turned my head to look back.
That monster-like knight had disappeared, but village folk were still guarding the entrance.
"Light several fires. There might be some trying to escape!"
"I'll go report to the castle."
The villagers, who were trembling just moments ago, now seemed a bit excited.
They were the first people I had met since being born here.
For some reason, I could understand the language they were speaking.
I'd like to go over there and at least talk to them.
I'm actually not a snake, but a person... Please help me a little. My body is like this. That's what I'd like to say.
Of course, the only sounds I can make are 'Saak!' or 'Shiritshirit', so it's impossible.
"We need to wipe them all out."
"We have to kill them all now while they're still immature. They could become dangerous if they grow up."
And it was clear that these villagers were trying to kill me and my siblings.
As far as I know, there's no way out of the cave... This is big trouble.
Right, anyway, it seems I can't escape alone right now.
I need to assess my situation a bit more objectively.
I closed my eyes while hiding my body behind a rock.
When I squeeze my eyes shut and concentrate, I can see something interesting.
──────────────
[Little White Snake lv1]
──────────────
That's right! I wasn't a Medusa Serpent lv1.
I'm a different species from my mother.
It seemed likely. Looking at my siblings, none of them had human faces.
I didn't have the ability to shoot eye beams and turn prey to stone either.
If I had to guess, maybe I could evolve someday if this thing called level goes up.
Or since snakes are creatures that shed their skin, maybe something will change that way.
It wasn't just my species I could see.
──────────────
[Traits]
[Indomitable], [Perseverance]
[Skills]
[Venomous Fang lv1], [Quick Crawling lv1 (new!)]
──────────────
These are the resources I have.
The trait Indomitable is related to Mental Strength. I couldn't quite grasp what Perseverance was about.
The skills I could actually use were things like crawling and Venomous Fang.
Although it wasn't in my skills, maybe because I was born in a cave.
I could see clearly inside the dark cave.
If I couldn't, I would have died long ago.
Seeing Venomous Fang, it seems I am indeed a venomous snake.
But honestly, I'm not sure how much I can use it, or how strong the venom is.
It doesn't seem to be of much help for survival yet.
The skill I gained this time was crawling.
I acquired it when I crawled with all my might earlier.
The name was unimpressive, but it seemed important.
Shouting 'crawling!' in my mind didn't activate the skill.
'Is this how to use it...'
So I crawled with all my might.
Slurp, my body moves.
... It seems a bit faster, maybe.
To be honest, it didn't get incredibly fast.
When Medusa Mom rested in the cave, she let her children loose.
I tried crawling around diligently then, but I never gained such a skill.
Then why did I gain the skill this time?
Isn't it because I crawled fast with all my might?
That was the only thing I could think of.
So I tried crawling once more with all my heart and soul.
Slurp, slurp.
Slurp, slurp, slurp.
Being a cold-blooded animal, I couldn't sweat, but I crawled like my life depended on it.
Then there was a change.
「Due to your great Potential, your skill proficiency increases rapidly.」
「Quick Crawling lv1 has become Quick Crawling lv2.」
Quick Crawling leveled up to lv2.
I could feel that it got a bit faster.
Still, it's much slower than a person running.
Even so, if I train hard like this and raise it to lv10, maybe I can survive somehow.
Nope, not possible~
That wasn't possible.
I was exhausted after crawling with all my might.
If you're a week old, isn't it amazing to even babble, let alone walk?
Hurray for Potential 20.
──────────────
[Status] Hungry, Exhausted
──────────────
Damn, I'm hungry.
Medusa Mom would regurgitate her prey and feed it to her babies.
It was half-digested and utterly disgusting, but I diligently ate that mush-like meat every day with my strong mental fortitude.
It was a growth period where my body grew day by day.
But now I've starved for a full day, so I have no energy at all.
Crawling hard made me even hungrier.
First, I need to go deep into the cave where my siblings are.
If I move together with thousands of snakes, somehow the chances of survival should increase.
In my previous life, I was an only child. Now I have many reliable siblings.
Such naive expectations of mine were soon shattered.
In the dark inner part of the cave, my siblings were tangled with each other.
They weren't hugging intensely to overcome a difficult situation.
Surprisingly, they were biting each other.
As soon as Medusa Mom disappeared, they were acting on instinct.
These pathetic ones!
Snakes usually swallow and digest their prey in one bite.
But the teeth of me and my siblings were dense and sharp like those of a shark. They seemed to have evolved to be able to tear apart prey.
They were tearing each other's flesh with those teeth.
Change of plan.
It seemed better to wait until those guys satisfied their hunger.
Just as I was about to turn and hide in a crevice.
"Shiririt."
A snake bigger than me blocked my way and flicked its tongue.
Uh, bro, could you move aside?
I flicked my tongue too, but he didn't seem to have any intention of moving.
I concentrated on my eyeballs to observe my ferocious brother.
──────────────
[Little Green Snake lv3]
──────────────
Come to think of it, I'm the only one with a white body, so I must stand out.
My brother's level was two higher than mine.
When did he secretly eat insects or bats without mom knowing?
No, looking at the blood around his mouth, it seems he just ate another sibling.
Looking at the traits and skills of this domestic violence perpetrator.
──────────────
[Traits]
[Ferocity]
[Skills]
[Venomous Fang lv2], [Quick Crawling lv2], [Bite and Tear lv1]
──────────────
He has better skills than me.
Could my brother also have Potential 20?
Instead of answering, my brother lunged at me with a 'Saak!'.